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OBAMA TO NAME MEL WATT AS HOUSING CHIEF: President Barack Obama intends to nominate Rep. Melvin Watt to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the government regulator that oversees lending giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, a White House official told the Associated Press.  The president was expected to name Watt, a 20-year veteran of the House, on Wednesday, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of the announcement.

HOUSE, SENATE STILL APART ON TAX PLAN: Senate Republicans are expected to debut a comprehensive tax plan in coming days -- but don't expect the House to stand at their side. Rep. David Lewis, the lead House tax negotiator, said Tuesday they still haven't found complete agreement. "The two chambers are not yet on one accord," he said. Lewis said he's optimistic the two sides will still unify around a single plan. He wouldn't identify the sticking point but it is likely how to pay for the plan -- with the Senate wanting to tax dozens of new services and the House wanting a more modest approach.

***Click below to keep reading the Dome Morning Memo for more details on Watt's new post -- and what it means in North Carolina -- as well as more political news and analysis.***

The bill was voted down in Hager's own committee last week 18-13, but he's got it scheduled to be taken up again in the House Committee on Public Utilities and Energy on Wednesday.

Hager was unavailable for comment but Dallas Woodhouse, North Carolina director for the Arlington, Va.-based Americans for Prosperity, which has supported Hager's bill, offered his opinion: “While there was not the right mix in the committee on that day, some of them may need more education.”

That presumably includes Rep. Tim Moore of Cleveland County, chair of the House Rules Committee; Conference Leader Ruth Samuelson of Mecklenburg County; and Wake County’s Nelson Dollar, senior chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. All three voted against the bill. Read the full story here.

TILLIS SAYS LOBBYIST GIFT BAN WILL REMAIN INTACT: House Speaker Thom Tillis took to Twitter this week to declare Republican Robert Brawley's bill to lift the ban on lobbyists giving lawmakers gifts is dead. "Benny, does the fact that the bill is dead give you any idea?" @thomtillis wrote. The speaker's office confirmed the 10:10 p.m. Tuesday tweet was legit. Tillis addressed the response to Benjamin Ray, an operative at the N.C. Democratic Party pushing Tillis on the issue and tying it to his office's controversial past with lobbyists and the fact the bill came from one of his committee chairman.

MOTIVE FOR JAMIE HAHN'S STABBING TURNS TO CAMPAIGN MONEY: As the Triangle mourned slain political strategist Jamie Hahn on Wednesday, attention turned to whether the man who police say stabbed her had made questionable campaign finance reports while working for Hahn’s firm. More on the story below.

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The bill appeared fast-tracked but had a rough go in its first of several committee meetings. Gov. Pat McCrory has said he expects the bill to undergo some changes.

The bill's sponsor, Rep. Mike Hager, R-Rutherford, has ran into some opposition to the bill in his own backyard. The Daily Courier reports that the town manager of Lake Lure has written a letter to Hager explaining that the town's finances would be hurt by the bill because the dam at Lake Lure produces renewable energy that it sells back to Duke Energy under the current law. The town made $425,000 in 2010 though the amount varies. The funds are used for upkeep of the old dam.

TODAY AT THE STATEHOUSE: Lawmakers return this evening with both the House and Senate convening at 7 p.m.

WHERE'S GOV. PAT?:Gov. Pat McCrory visits GlaxoSmithKline in Research Triangle Park. The visit is closed to the press and public.

***Good Monday morning. Thanks for reading the Dome Morning Memo. A roundup of North Carolina political news and analysis below.***

Now with Gov. Pat McCrory's support, a measure to thwart President Obama's health care law is headed to the House floor.

A House health care committee tweaked Senate Bill 4 -- which blocks the expansion of Medicaid and prevents a state-sponsored exchange -- before approving it largely on party lines by a 16 to 7 vote. The House added a fix to help address concerns about funding of the state's current Medicaid system. The full House is expected to hear the bill Wednesday and Thursday and it will need to return to the Senate because of the change.

Lawmakers gave the legislation a healthy discussion and Republicans shot down two amendments offered by Rep. Verla Insko, a Chapel Hill Democrat, who called the bill "an attack on poor people."

The debate rehashed partisan talking points with Republicans concerned about the financial obligations of the program, particularly after the federal government stops paying the full load, and Democrats eager to extend a safety net and reduce the number of uninsured people in North Carolina.

TODAY IN POLITICS: Gov. Pat McCrory will address the media for the first time since his inflammatory comments about higher education funding and liberal arts studies at a 10 a.m. press conference ostensibly about the state's Medicaid system. At the statehouse, House lawmakers will consider a controversial bill to curtail unemployment benefits while senators work on legislation to block the expansion of Medicaid under the federal healthcare law. In Washington, the confirmation hearings for Defense Secretary nominee Chuck Hagel begin as U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan faces pressure in recent TV ads to vote against.

OP-ED: McCRORY'S EDUCATION REMARKS BETRAY CONSERVATIVE PRINCIPLES: Political communications consultant and college lecturer Jonathan Riehl and former Reagan campaign official Scot Faulkner write in this morning's N&O: "With the governor’s star rising in the GOP, his comments no doubt were strategic. They also represent a total betrayal of conservative principle."

***This is the Dome Morning Memo -- a look at North Carolina politcs news and analysis. Click "Read More" for additional headlines and news.***

While North Carolina experienced a predicted blockbuster political year in 2012, the details weren't as anticipated by some.

Charlotte hosted North Carolina's first-ever major party national convention. A proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage in North Carolina passed by a whopping 22 percentage points. And although it wasn't shocking that former Charlotte mayor Pat McCrory was elected governor, the ease of his victory was surprising, as was his Democratic rival - Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton, not Gov. Beverly Perdue. Read AP's political year in review here.

More political headlines below:

--North Carolina’s Clean Water Management Trust Fund, which has spent nearly $1 billion to clean up polluted waters and protect untainted ones, will face a dicey future as legislators convene in January.

--The N.C. House’s new Republican majority whip believes he has the votes to stop North Carolina’s green-energy mandate – the first in the Southeast when it was enacted in 2007 – in its tracks. Rep. Mike Hager of Rutherford County views the mandate as the government unfairly “picking winners and losers” in the marketplace. As chairman of the Public Utilities committee, Hager would like to freeze it at the current 3 percent level.

The state House GOP caucus on Saturday, meeting in High Point, chose its leaders for the coming session.

Rep. Paul "Skip" Stam of Apex was promoted from majority leader to speaker pro tem. This will be his seventh term.The previous pro tem, Rep. Dale Folwell, left office to run unsuccessfully for lieutenant governor. The pro tem steps in to run sessions when the speaker is absent. Speaker Thom Tillis of Cornelius was re-elected to the post last month.

Rep. Edgar Starnes, from Caldwell County, was chosen Majority Leader. Starnes has been in the House since 1993.